Water quality testing is essential for human health, environmental protection and industrial processing. Water testing is conducted in laboratory, manufacturing and field settings. Testing parameters are determined by the test purpose, which in many cases is based on regulatory requirements. New environmental regulations in developing nations and more sensitive testing techniques are driving market growth for water analysis instrumentation. The markets for laboratory and process instruments for water analysis are each expected to show a compound annual growth rate in the mid-single digits over five years (see graph, page 4).

There are five basic categories of laboratory instrumentation used in water quality testing (see table, page 4). The largest market in terms of dollar amount among these five categories is separation instrumentation. It is also the fastest-growing market due to newly developed applications for the detection and quantification of complex chemical contaminants, such as pharmaceuticals and fertilizers, in surface/ground/potable water and wastewater. Developments in LC/MS instrumentation have enabled better resolution and selectivity and faster throughput, which are expected to make sales of this instrument category the fastest growing among laboratory separation techniques over the next five years. HPLC and LC/MS are currently the largest initial systems markets among separation techniques for water analysis.

The second-largest market for laboratory water analysis instruments consists of atomic spectroscopy techniques. However, it is the third-fastest growing market among the five categories of laboratory techniques discussed here. Market growth is the result of the increase in governmental testing requirements related to trace metals such as arsenic, lead and mercury, and other elemental pollutants. Although inductively coupled plasma spectroscopy (ICP) is the largest market, it is the ICP-MS market that is estimated to exhibit the best five-year sales growth among atomic spectroscopy techniques. This growth is due to the continuing evolution of the technology and the demand for higher sensitivity as regulations continue to specify lower detection limits.

The third-largest market by revenue for laboratory water analysis techniques is electrochemistry equipment. By volume, these systems account for the largest market share among laboratory water analysis techniques, but their average selling prices result in a lower market share by revenue. The maturity of these techniques and their sizable installed base will result in a slower five-year growth rate in comparison to other categories of laboratory water analysis instruments. Among the techniques, pH/oxidation reduction potential currently accounts for the majority of demand. Dissolved oxygen (DO) equipment is expected to show the fastest growth over a five-year period due to the use of new optical, fluorescence-based and luminescence-based DO sensors.

Instrumentation for process analysis addresses many of the same analytes as laboratory instrumentation but is used within manufacturing environments, including online, and in the field. Although many of the same analytical techniques are utilized both inside and outside a laboratory, process instrumentation is characterized by different configurations, different operating parameters and higher detection limits, among other factors, compared with laboratory instrumentation.

There are two primary categories of process instrumentation for water analysis: electrochemistry and other (see table). Process electrochemistry techniques constitute the larger market. Among the process electrochemistry techniques discussed here, sales of DO instrumentation are expected to grow the fastest over a five-year period due to the development of new sensors.

The largest market within the other process instrumentation category is total organic carbon/total nitrogen analyzers. However, the category that is expected to exhibit the fastest five-year growth rate is the category that contains analyzers that have smaller installed bases. This category includes online toxicity analyzers, HPLC systems and ion chromatography instruments.

Companies focused on water instrumentation that offer both lab and process instruments include Hach (Danaher), ITT Analytical Instruments and YSI. Other companies participating in both the lab and process instrumentation markets are HORIBA, Metrohm, Mettler-Toledo, Shimadzu and Thermo Fisher Scientific. The market information used in this article is based on a forthcoming Strategic Directions International report on water analysis instrumentation.

 Categories of Water Instrumentation

 Laboratory Techniques

  

 Separations                 HPLC, LC/MS, GC, GC/MS, Ion Chromatography

 Laboratory Electrochemistry pH/ORP (Oxidation Reduction Potential), DO (Dissolved Oxygen)/BOD (Biochemical Oxygen Demand),

                             Titrators, Conductivity/Total Dissolved Solids, Ion Selective Electrodes and Specific Meters

 Atomic Spectroscopy         Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy, Inductively Couple Plasma Spectroscopy (ICP), ICP-MS

                             Spectroscopy

 Other Laboratory            TOC (Total Organic Carbon)/TN (Total Nitrogen) Analyzers, Continuous Flow Analyzers and

                             Discrete Analyzers, Other (Fluorescence Spectroscopy, Oil-in/On-Water Analyzers, Toxicity

                             Analyzers)

 UV and Visible Spectroscopy Colorimeters, UV/Visible Spectroscopy, Turbidimeters

 Process Techniques  

 Process Electrochemistry    pH/ORP, DO, ISE and Specific Analytes, Turbidity, Conductivity/TDS

 Other Process               TOC/TN Analyzers, Colorimetric/Discrete Analyzers, COD/BOD/Organics Analyzers, Other

 Total Lab and Process Water Analysis Instrument Demand

 2011       $2,549

 2012       $2,625

 2013       $2,737

 2014       $2,891

 2015       $3,048